The Misery of 21st Century Work

In the beginning, there was an idea; a simple design that might change the world and surely will delight all our customers. That idea, I shared it with all my team, and we were wholly engaged because it wasn't a project, it was a case.

Our energy and commitment were awesome. We worked with our customer, and he got some small pieces of work completed every month, and our client gave us a lot of feedback, allowing us to sharpen our impact. After a couple of months, the project was delivered, and we all celebrated that tremendous achievement. It was November, and we had discussed with the customer on new evolutions of that project. At that time, my manager came to me for my yearly evaluation. At the end of that meeting, he told me "Look, you and your team did a great job. We have this project running out the roof. Would you like to take over and save us?"

I asked what will happen with the current project? He told me that he has already chosen a junior project manager who can take over. What happened? The superhero instinct pushes me to accept the challenge. I came back to the team and told them that I received the new challenge, and I wanted to know who is following me.

Some said that they had already another assignment from their line managers, and only a few were left to follow me.

And here is the starting point of the misery that occurs in 21st-century organizations. Instead of keeping the existing team dynamic to evolve with the customer, the units are split with the idea that the process, the magic, might repeat.